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Wednesday, February 8, 2012

MST3K: Episode 213 - Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster

I am watching all the episodes of Mystery Science Theater 3000 episodes, and doing it in the order they aired. More about this can be found here and here.

Episode 213: Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster

First aired: The Comedy Channel on 2 February 1991Availability: MST3KVideos.com

Joel & the Bots are late to the theater

Season Two ends with an episode has never been commercially released. As such, I have a fan copy. I never saw it when it first aired. There are no channel logos on my copy, so I'm not sure if it's from The Comedy Channel or from Comedy Central. It's a good copy, though. It's the standard one available for trade on the fan sites.

This episode is also the last first-run episode to debut on The Comedy Channel. The channel would merge with HA! on April 1, 1991, and become CTV, then changing its name to Comedy Central on June 1 of that same year.

The Invention Exchange was okay. It featured one of Joel's fake hand gags. In this one, he played the Mind Control Guitar. It was clever, but not one of my favorite gags. The Mads' Chew Toy Guitar was just plain annoying.

"The weather started getting rough." "The tiny ship was tossed."

When the movie started, Joel & the Bots are late getting to the theater. They miss the title screen. And that's the basis for an on-going joke along the line of "What's the name of this film?"

This film is the 7th in the Godzilla series. It was never released to American theaters, the first of the franchise to go directly to television.

The plot (yes, there's a plot) involves a stolen yacht, a shipwreck, an evil plot to enslave people or something, and big silly Japanese monsters. It stars Akira Takarada, who's been in six of the films in the franchise, as well as some other big silly Japanese monster movies. You might not know his name, but if you've seen any Godzilla or similar movies, there's a good chance you've seen him and would recognize him.

Hot Japanese damsel in distress

Creepy Mothra Twins

There are no hot Japanese she-villains, but there is a hot Japanese damsel in distress, which is just as good. The Mothra Twins show up, but they're just kinda creepy. And not in a good way.

Evil giant shrimp

Go go Godzilla!

The monster villain is called "Ebirah" and he's a giant crab or something. Mothra shows up later, to rescue the people who are stranded on the island before it blows up. Godzilla beats the crab-critter, kicks the bad guys' butts, has some words with Mothra, then walks off the island.

Mothra saves the humans

Mothra visits the SOL

The whole feel of the movie is odd. Turns out that this wasn't a Godzilla movie, but a King Kong movie. However, when the production company couldn't secure the rights, they inserted Godzilla as the monster hero. That explains the whole throwing rocks at the crab-critter as well as his looking admiringly at the hot Japanese damsel in distress, reminiscent of Kong and Fay Wray.